Microsoft Announces Imagine Cup 2009 Worldwide Winners

CAIRO, Egypt — July 7, 2009 — After an intense competition among finalists chosen from a pool of more than 300,000 students from more than 100 countries and regions, Microsoft Corp. announced the winners of Imagine Cup 2009. Celebrating first place, Romania’s Team SYTECH won the worldwide Software Design invitational, South Korea’s Team Wafree won the Embedded Development invitational and Brazil’s Team LEVV It won the Game Development challenge. Imagine Cup, the world’s premier student technology competition, empowers students to unlock their creative genius and build solutions that tackle real-world issues facing society today.

Team SYTECH from Romania (at left) took first place in the Software Design competition. Coming in second was Vital Lab, from Russia (center), while Virtual Dreams from Brazil (right) earned third. Looking on is S. Somasegar, senior vice president of the Developer Division for Microsoft.

“The creativity and imagination that students poured into their projects this year was incredible,” said Joe Wilson, senior director of Academic Initiatives, Developer & Platform Evangelism Division at Microsoft. “Many of these projects have the potential to have a serious impact on how we address society’s most pressing issues. We hope that all of the students who participated this year will continue their pursuit of creating technology in the service of making the world a better place.”

The software design, embedded development and game development finalist teams created applications, devices and games using Microsoft technology based on this year’s theme: “Imagine a world where technology helps solve the toughest problems facing us today.”

A total of 444 students from 149 teams representing 70 countries and regions competed in the Imagine Cup 2009 Worldwide Finals in nine categories: Software Design, Embedded Development, Game Development, IT Challenge, Robotics and Algorithm, MashUp, Photography, Short Film and Design. In addition to the main categories of competition, there are several Achievement Awards this year: the Interoperability Award, Unlimited Potential Design for Development Award, Unlimited Potential MultiPoint Education Award, Accessibility Award, Accessible Design Award, Parallel Computing Award, Tablet Accessibility Award, Live Services Award, Windows Mobile Award, and the H.E. Mrs. Suzanne Mubarak Special Award, sponsored by the first lady of Egypt through the Cyber Peace Initiative (CPI).

The winners were announced in a gala awards ceremony this evening at the base of Egypt’s historic pyramids as part of the Imagine Cup World Festival, a celebration drawing Imagine Cup competitors, mentors and other key attendees from around the world. The following are the top three finalists by invitational in finishing order:

Among the enthusiastic winning teams was LEVV It from Brazil, here waving to the crowd after being given their award for first place in the Game Development division. At left is S. Somasegar, senior vice president of the Developer Division for Microsoft.

Software Design

First Place: Romania — SYTECH

Second Place: Russia — Vital Lab

Third Place: Brazil — Virtual Dreams

Embedded Development

First Place: South Korea — Wafree

Second Place: China — iSee

Third Place: Ukraine — Intellectronics

Game Development

First Place: Brazil — LEVV It

Second Place: United States — Epsylon Games

Third Place: United Kingdom — Sanquine Labs

Robotics and Algorithm

First Place: Czech Republic — Lukáš Perůtka

Second Place: Canada — Byron Knoll

Third Place: China — Lin Fuming

Team Wafree from South Korea won the top award in the Embedded Development competition.

IT Challenge

First Place: Romania — Cosmin Ilie

Second Place: China — Wu Chang

Third Place: Bolivia — Miklos Cari Sivila

MashUp

First Place: United States — CURIOUS

Second Place (tie): Poland – Monastery of Innovations

Second Place (tie): Singapore – PlanetKY

Photography

First Place: Croatia —Voodoo Delirium

Second Place: Singapore — Woolgathering

Third Place: Japan — Terada

Short Film

First Place: United Kingdom — Fulham Four

Second Place: India — ChennaiCoolers

Third Place: Ukraine — Just4Fun

Design

First Place: Brazil — Willburn

Second Place: United States — eXchangeFun

Third Place: France — Paindepices

In addition to the category awards, 10 Achievement Awards were presented.

Interoperability Award. The Interoperability Award is designed to recognize the software application that best leverages out-of-the-box Microsoft technologies and blends them with other technologies to connect people, data or diverse systems in a new way. This award was won by:

First Place: Brazil — Proativa Team

Second Place: Poland — Fteams

Third Place: Jordan — ECRAM

Unlimited Potential Design for Development Award. This award challenges students to create a software solution that can be accessed from a basic mobile phone and designed to meet the needs of end users who earn less than $8 (U.S.) a day. This award was won by:

First Place: Malaysia — COSMIC

Second Place: China — Unique Studio

Third Place: Malaysia — Capricorn

Unlimited Potential MultiPoint Education Award. This award encourages students to unlock new ways for the PC to help address universal education goals. This award was won by:

First Place: India — Trailblazers

Accessibility Award. Students are challenged to design a technology solution that leverages people’s diverse physical and cognitive abilities. This award was won by:

First Place: Saudi Arabia — ATST

Second Place: Mexico – Ignis Nova

Accessible Design Award: Students who participated in the Design competition were awarded additional recognition for a technology solution that best addressed accessibility needs. This award was won by:

First Place: United States — eXchangeFun

Parallel Computing Award. Parallel applications can open a door to the future, and this award challenges students to use parallel technology to solve the world’s toughest problems. This award was won by:

First Place: India — Biollel

Tablet Accessibility Award. The objective of the Tablet Accessibility Award is to create a new education application that uses Tablet technology while expanding the possibilities for how a user interacts with the computer. This award was won by:

First Place: United States — Auratech

Second Place: Brazil — IC-UNICAMP

Live Services Award: This award challenges students to create a technology solution built on Microsoft’s Azure Services Platform to solve the world’s toughest problems. This award was won by:

First Place: France — Help’Aged

Second Place: Serbia — BrainWave

Windows Mobile Award: This award challenges students to use Windows Mobile technology to solve the world’s toughest problems. This award was won by:

First Place (tie): Croatia – Team Explorer

First Place (tie): Indonesia – Big Bang

First Place (tie): Brazil – Virtual Dreams

H.E. Mrs. Suzanne Mubarak Special Award. Sponsored by the first lady of Egypt, this award was given to the project that best intersects the following: the Imagine Cup 2009 theme, “Imagine a world where technology helps solve the toughest problems facing us today”; the Millennium Development Goals; and the objectives of the Suzanne Mubarak Women’s International Peace Movement and the Cyber Peace Initiative. This award was won by:

First Place: Poland — kAMUflage

Second Place: Egypt — Big Buddy

Third Place: France — WikiChildProtect

Next year’s Imagine Cup 2010 Worldwide Finals will take place in Poland, a country with a track record of producing highly skilled IT students as well as successful Imagine Cup entrants. Registrations for Imagine Cup 2010 open tomorrow, July 8, 2009. More information about Imagine Cup can be found at http://www.imaginecup.com.

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